Three fuel foils in 2 years

[Ali-bear]

Grow up FFS

Yeah grow up and take it like a man

 

[Sgt Bilco]

Yeah grow up and take it like a man

I was actually refering the old "fit for purpose" and "sale of goods act" which many people seem to quote but rarely does it work. Also, "forum evidence" is nothing but heresay and not a court in the land would use it in a case.

 

[Martyn H]

According to bmw all genuine spares have a full two year warranty BUT if the part was fitted by a BMW dealer under warranty to replace a failed part it does not.

Said it before failures like this would be not be acceptable to BMW car customers.

To certain members of this forum I would say get your heads out of the sand , BMW motorcycles have faults , they are not perfect and it does not mean that as customers we should meekly accept their bad design and pay to fix them
If the fuel foils were a good idea, they would not have gone back to a conventional float arrangement on later bikes, in doing so they are admitting there is a fault so why should they not pay for the fix.

I don't think anyone's arguing that there isn't a fault. It's just that some of us can't be arsed enough to get worked up about it. Zero the trip at every refill, & fill up at what you consider to be a "safe" mileage.

 

[Neil W]

Yes I know that a fuel gauge problem is not life threatening in the grand scheme of things but people meekly accepted fpc failures (due to a bad design) and final drive failures on early 1200's , the final drive failures on 1150's and are now quite happily accepting the gearbox/ clutch problems on the the new WC models.

Their rationale being that BMW's are perfect , never go wrong and it is acceptable to face hefty bills on an expensive motorcycle after only a couple of years (which in my opinion it is not).

Remember the early Honda VF750 with their cams etc, almost killed off Honda's reputation and by god they fixed it with the VFR750 series which replaced it .

If these were prestige BMW motors then they would be splashed over Top Gear , Watchdog etc and BMW would be falling over backwards to sort out a one hit fix.

BMW can absolutely nail the design of a bike to fit into or even create a niche market, and can turn out some models that never seem to have any problems BUT when they do f**k up why should customers foot the bill

 

[Deleted account 190920001]

Yes I know that a fuel gauge problem is not life threatening in the grand scheme of things but people meekly accepted fpc failures (due to a bad design) and final drive failures on early 1200's , the final drive failures on 1150's and are now quite happily accepting the gearbox/ clutch problems on the the new WC models.

Their rationale being that BMW's are perfect , never go wrong and it is acceptable to face hefty bills on an expensive motorcycle after only a couple of years (which in my opinion it is not).

Remember the early Honda VF750 with their cams etc, almost killed off Honda's reputation and by god they fixed it with the VFR750 series which replaced it .

If these were prestige BMW motors then they would be splashed over Top Gear , Watchdog etc and BMW would be falling over backwards to sort out a one hit fix.

BMW can absolutely nail the design of a bike to fit into or even create a niche market, and can turn out some models that never seem to have any problems BUT when they do f**k up why should customers foot the bill

Your right but I wonder how many put up with it because they genuinely love the bike and what it does? Range Rovers and Land Rovers spring to mind. There was a time where you could barely expect to get to the end of the road without breaking down. People still loved them though because when they worked they were the best at what they did. I am quite sure that if they weren't so good Land Rover would have went the same way as the rest of the British car industry so maybe people aren't really defending BMW. They are defending the bike because when everything is right it is without doubt one of the best at what it does.

Your VF example fits as well. It wasn't a good bike anyway, none of the Honda range was very good at the time and in fact reliability had been an issue for a number of years before it. CB550-750 sohc cam bearings or lack of. CB900 dohc camchains and exploding cranks and rods. CBX550 main bearings and then hot on the heels the VF750 with chocolate cams and chain because they didn't machine it properly. All of these bikes (some are classics now) were mediocre anyway so yes it all nearly killed Honda. People now think of Honda as one of the finest manufactured bikes on the market. You hear this all the time on these forums. What you don't hear often though is how great the bikes are. The truth is that if Honda made the GS it would be bullet proof. The question is though, would it be as good?

 

[AlexG]

Well that repair didn't last long...3rd or 4th tank of fuel since the repair this morning and after filling up the gauge dropped to empty as soon as I turned the ignition on!

I'll try zapping it again, but I am not very hopeful that it offers a long term solution (but then neither does replacing the fuel strip). I just want shot of the warning!

Thought I'd post another update because I have observed something 'new'...

I tried zapping a few more times and each time it would last a short while and then fail again, so I was in the habit of zapping once every couple of weeks.

While all this was going on I also had an intermittent Lampf warning - under full throttle accel occasionally the warning would come on, but there were never any bulbs out and the warning would clear after turning everything off and back on again. I put it down to a loose wire somewhere, but couldn't find anything.
In desperation several weeks ago I changed both headlight bulbs and the sidelight, my only observation being that the sidelight bulb was a touch black inside (but still worked). The Lampf has not recurred since changing the bulbs.

Now here is the odd thing...not only has the Lampf not recurred, but the fuel gauge has worked impeccably ever since.
It just seems too much of a coincidence to be unrelated, but I don't know enough about the canbus system to work out whether I am reading too much into this.
What I am wondering is whether the canbus is 'clever' enough to alter the voltage/current to the dodgy bulb to keep it working, but in so doing hose the fuel strip?

 

[Deleted account 190920001]

Unrelated I would say. The ZF unit has no way to up the voltage higher than battery/charging voltage plus it's not clever enough to know a lamp is about to blow. Putting more voltage into a failing lamp would just make it blow quicker anyway. Maybe your last zap was just a good one.

 

[Bendy toy]

The Canbus is unlikely to be changing the bulb voltage (difficult to achieve by any means). But the dodgy bulb might cause the software to get confused.

Something like interference in the system (wiring, electronics or software) could conceivably cause the Canbus to trigger a fuel strip fault when its actually a side light bulb. Or maybe it copes when only one or the other is weak.

 

[Gordon T]

Just out of curiosity, has anyone measured the resistance of a new fuel strip and compared it to a broken one?

 

[(RIP) orbit]

Open cct when not working, 2.4K after 5 quick zaps measured on the two centre contacts of the plug socket , still working and accurate to the last 5 kms range, then I filled up again. No idea of the resistance of a new one

 

[davegs]

100,000

Congrats Chris, done the Dalton once on the old 1150 (90,000 ) so ,you've done well. Keep up the good work